This of course is the perennial, fundamental question as Zizek shows us. Just as when Freud famously asked What Do Women Want? We never get over this question: what does the Other want? But there is a corollary of Lacan-Zizek, that says: The mysteries of the Russians were mysteries to the Russians as well.
In other words the Other herself(seems particularly appropriate to refer to the Other as female, as she is our ultimate, original Other: our mother; this is just as true for women as for men) finds herself as enigmatic as we find her. Ultimately she doesn't know either. She never gives us a satisfactory answer for what women want because she doesn't know.
As to the concrete matter at hand, while early on there were a lot of complaints that the media was ignoring or trivializing the protests, this is no longer the case at least to the extent that most news outlets are now paying attention and reporting widely. Now however, some have complained that the protesters have no defined set of goals and objectives, that they don't know what they want.
This would seem to be false depending how you look at it. Certainly there have been thousands of protesters carrying thousands of signs which have some pretty clear demands. I will mention 4 of note-out of the thousands. There was a sign that demanded the "end of consumer culture." Another declared "we can do better than capitalism." A third demands a tax on millionaires. A fourth demands reform of the derivatives market-impressive that someone actually managed to fit that onto a sign.
While there have been thousands of slogans, chants, and demands, I selected these 4 as a microcosm as they divide very evenly into what you could label two different sets of demands. The first two: ending consumer culture and doing better than capitalism are kind of huge metaphysical demands-or at least meta-political. Actually ending consumer culture would take a lot more than even electing someone into office who ran on such a platform, even if his name was Ralph Nader. Yet from my stand point I don't even know that I want to end it-my complaint is not that consumer culture is too shallow and meaningless but that due to my unemployment I can't particpate in it nearly as much as I would like. Doing better than capitalism is another meta-political demand, there is no particular policy that someone who ran under such a platform even if he were elected to President could sign upon Inauguration that would magically achieve this. It would be possible to tomorrow have an elected politician declare "I have ended capitalism" and this would mean about as much as if he declared "I have ended the practice of the earth revolving around the sun. From now on the sun will revolve around the earth."
Then again I for one don't have any desire to do better than capitalism-lol. That doesn't mean though that I can't support the movement. If you were to take a poll, some of the protesters would agree with doing better than capitalism some wouldn't, but that's ok as there is no litmus test for this type of movement. There is no particular set of beliefs or opinions you have to have to join. So some may see consumer culture as an evil others not. Some may want to do better than capitalism others not. A movement of this nature is not about holding or not holding any particular position.
But these two demands are kind of imprecise open ended demands for major changes that we don't know if they are or are not achievable or even desirable. Put it this way, of all the countries that have declared themselves socialist/communist-I define "socialist" not as France or Italy who have "socialist" party politicians or in Italy's case even "communist" party politicians but countries who have honestly tried to end the private market; these are only a handful: the defunct USSR, Cuba, China(which effectively gave up on ending capitalism with Deng's rise), Venezuela under Chavez is trying today-none has ever achieved socialism or in many meaningful way ended capitalism. This was not due to lack of demand but to the fact that a political revolution in itself - no matter how communist it may want to be-cannot do it by itself.
The bottom line is that neither ending "capitalism" or even a "consumer culture" can be done over night. On the other hand demanding a tax on millionaires-such as what Obama has already called for-or regulating the derivatives market-as no less than Warren Buffett himself has called for-are tangible policy demands that could with the correct political makeup happen immediately. It is this latter type of demand that many have urged OWS to take up and I prefer such demands myself and do think that they are more likely to draw in mainstream America in a way that more meta-political demands will not as those are too open ended and intangible.
However it must be understood that not all protesters will see it this way. Those who are urging this second type of demand in preference to the first may be accused of trying to "co-opt" OWS. I would expect this to be a recurring tension as long as OWS keeps going, between these two different conceptions. The ultimate hope is that this will prove to be a sustainable movement of the kind that the Progressives were at the turn of the 20th century, the civil rights marches were in the 60s, and recently the LGBT has been today. What all these movements did was achieve real tangible political achievements; recently here in NY we saw LGBT activism lead to the legalization of gay marriage, which was voted for by a Republican dominated NY state senate.
However I again caution that some in OWS will see this as a crude instrumentalization of their activity that they see as seeking a brand new society. Indeed they are two OWS movements as Ezra Klein suggests and the one that already has it's own little society growing, picking up it's own trash, with its own lost and found and producing its own paper-the Occupied Wall Street Journal-in Zucotti Park is more concerned with the form their protest activity takes than necessarily what policy goals are ultimately achieved which doesn't mean they are indifferent to it obviously-it is the whole initial motivation for their action.
Here is Klein's take. For those-I would put myself among them-who desire a broad movement that consigns itself mostly to tangible demands that with the right political configuration could be met quickly and would quickly improve Americans lives Klein notes of OWS that:
"Its roots are more radical and anarchist than that. One interesting takeaway from the protest site is that an enormous amount of the energy there is going into sustaining the community at Zucotti Park, which now has to manage food, sanitation, a newspaper (The Occupied Wall Street Journal), marches, a library, a decision-making process, a lost-and-found, and more.
"The effort to create “the sort of society you want to have in miniature” makes it hard to turn your attention to changing the society that’s all around you — and that ultimately limits your appeal. The number of people who want to sleep in the park and overthrow the system is not large. The number of people who want to express their frustration with the system and fight for a better deal might be.
"The effort to create “the sort of society you want to have in miniature” makes it hard to turn your attention to changing the society that’s all around you — and that ultimately limits your appeal. The number of people who want to sleep in the park and overthrow the system is not large. The number of people who want to express their frustration with the system and fight for a better deal might be.
"The leaderless, decentralized, consensus-driven nature of the protest will make that process of evolution and adaptation easier. After all, there’s no one in particular who can say, “That’s not what this movement is about.” If MoveOn.org begins organizing under the “We Are The 99 Percent” banner, who will stop them?
"One very possible future for the movement is it splits in two: The Occupy Wall Street effort, with its more radical aims and means, continues, and the “We Are the 99 Percent” movement becomes something broader and more directly engaged with the political process. Another is that it fizzles: The radical protest in Zucotti Park peters out, and the effort to create a more mainstream version fails. Another possibility is that it fractures: Just as there are hundreds of distinct tea party groups organized under separate and competing national coalitions, you could imagine a lot of different efforts organized under one name but representing diverse and contradicting ideas."
Having said all this, though in fact OWS has left some fairly explicit hints of its demands in the following link http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-demands-for-occupy-wall-st-moveme/
I was actually planning a full, comprehensive analysis of these 25 demands. However as this post has already gotten long enough I will do a teaser like Batman used to do and will write a part 2 to actually analyze these demands. So look out for it coming soon to a theater near you! Same Bat-time, same Bat- channel! I will say that the demands are very interesting and I find many of them very exciting.
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